This place deserves every ounce of hype. Also, if you (or your goddamned kids) taste more than one thing when the line is out the door, you deserve to be set on fire.
It's been a long time since I've evangelized as hard for a business as I have for Salt and Straw. The ice cream melts my brain. Every other ice cream place in town can GTFO.
Salt and Straw are the Voodoo Donuts of ice cream. Gimmicky flavors, huge national publicity, not actually very good. Better than stuff you'd get at the supermarket, but not by that much.
Not my favorite ice cream in town. Some of the flavors are just off - too icy, too airy, flavors too contrasting, etc. It's also slightly overpriced and very overhyped. Ruby Jewel, Cool Moon, or even upscale supermarket brands are better.
The whole thing is Willy Wonka stamped with the defining ability to push the boundaries of colloquium Oregonistic come lately and uber locallism gone mad.. its fuled by a single source of pure hyperbolic Portlandia chefism and hipsteresque band wagoning that IS Broussard PR firms crown jewel. Its an advertising guru and her friends yukking up the whole shebang with a financial mystery entwined in below average ice cream! Yes, I'm screaming